Smile
by Infidel Pumpkin
Summary: A quick C.C.-centric one-shot that I happened upon in My Documents the other day. Suggested C.C. x Lelouch; Post-Series. Please take the time to read/review! And its rated teen strictly for one measly word.


Let's spend a bit of time with our favorite witch, hmm?

This one was, in my opinion, a bit long for a drabble, and so I thought I'd submit it as a whole different story, as a one-shot. A depressing, post-series one-shot.

**WARNING: THIS IS POST SERIES!!! **You know what that means. Oh, and in case this is a definite no-no for you, there's suggested **C.C. x Lelouch**/CluClu/whatever the fanbases are calling it now.

Song: 'Exploration' by _Bruno Coulais, Mathilde Pellegrini, Hélène Breschand, Hungrarian Symphony Orchestra Budapest and Laurent Petitgirard_ (long, eh? Coraline Soundtrack.)

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_Smile_

Far into the countryside far off in the distance, there lived a woman with a far-flung spirit and fly-away lime hair, complete with isolated golden pupils.

Far and wide she wandered and through villages she rode upon a tall cart filled to the brim with hay, accompanied by a friendly man she'd found on her travels who she'd deemed to be quite the congenial travel-partner.

Though she seemed so far so much of the time she had a constant small smile, witty and bright and characterized. As such was the only defining factor of her wandering path, for the smile she held was so fair and solitary, solid and certain. Though the man with which she traveled had pondered such a dissimilarity to the rest of her features, she would not provide an answer very often, when he confronted her.

No matter what it was he asked of the strange woman who had no name, he would constantly be left with nothing but that smile that so haunted her eyes. Quite the predicament this man was in, for he had no idea of her background and barely a recognition of her very voice, for the only time he heard her was when she whispered.

The woman whispered to the sky a lot, the man concluded. She would raise her head and talk to no one, and conceivably receive a witty answer, and laugh at the clouds and sea of blue. Wondering about her was worrying to the man, for he had no idea whether she had either been through hell and back, or was insane. Both generally allowed the man to conclude that further questioning would result in losing his intriguing travel partner, and so he did not speak up much.

"Your name?" He'd asked one night, soon after she had hitched her first ride upon his hay cart. He did not receive an answer. Not a single uttering of a phrase, a syllable, not one.

It was not until the second week of their travels that he even heard her voice clearly. "I do not have a name." She said, and it took the man a moment before realizing that this was the answer to the question he'd asked many days previous. He nodded, going with the theory that she had simply gone insane and did not bother to ask her again of names.

"Why is your hair green, Miss?" Was the next question he asked, many weeks after his first, as asking questions and dwelling on each other was not a regular action between them.

"My hair is green because it can not remember what it used to be." She'd said, only five days later this time, a breakthrough. He nodded once more, accepting that she must have suffered some sort of trauma that left her confused and believing that she'd lived long enough for her hair to decide that it didn't know what shade it was supposed to be.

"And your eyes? Why are they so empty?" He asked next, delving into a dangerous topic that nearly made him perspire at the fear that he'd gone too far and lost his partner with a simple question.

"My eyes have seen everything they have needed to see and therefore have lost their will to shine." She said, three days later as they sat beside the fire. The man could nearly understand this one—this woman could very well have experienced a terrible emotional trauma. He'd seen it before, seen empty eyes and broken hearts—but this could not explain her smile.

He was afraid to even wonder about it, that perhaps it was some sort of sin to think about her, that perhaps she was a witch. He also wondered whether or not it was a sin to leave a poor distressed woman alone and not ask about her strange attributes that made her so fascinating.

"Why have you stayed with me and my cart?" He asked next, a simple out-of-the-blue question that had found itself upon his lips without any preliminary thought.

"Because I find you interesting." She'd responded the next day, and he was realizing this pattern in which she would answer a bit faster per question. Why was a simple cart man interesting to a woman so complex as her? What could possibly draw herself to him so?

"Why?" He asked immediately upon her answer, and she'd responded the next morning.

"Because you are different and yet simple. You live for nothing but yourself and are content with solitude. Solitude has been a prominent issue for me in the past," with this she looked down and twirled her shining green-yellow hair with her pointer finger, "but you are a hope that I can be alone and satisfied."

"Satisfied? Not happy?" He asked, confused.

"No." To his surprise she had responded immediately, not a second's thought. Her eyes had steeled and her smile had dissipated. "Not happy." She chuckled to herself. "Why am I investing my emotions within a man with a cart full of hay?" The man shrugged, and she laughed, short and sweet like honey, the color of her now blazing eyes.

There was a new life here, the man thought. Her eyes were now alive, her voice shuddering with a laugh so supple and full he desired so strongly to hear it more but could not find a way in which to pull it from her soul should he think to find it again. Her hair was brighter, her skin glowing, her eyes laughing with her voice. And yet, there still was no full characterization that she allowed him to see, there was still a feeling hiding.

It was here that the man realized it was hiding in her smile. Her smile was real and reliable, unlike the rest of her features. It had a truth behind it, one that spoke a long tale of pain and sadness that had, eventually, resolved itself peacefully. Her smile held acceptance, a long-lost love that had escaped her so cruelly. The man now had the thirst for more.

"Your smile. Why do you smile? If your eyes have seen it all," he noticed the woman calm and was sad to see the laughter go, "your hair has lost its color, and your name has been long forgotten," he took a quick breath, "why does your smile say otherwise?"

"Because," she began, "I miss him every day, and it angers me how human I have become because of one silly, arrogant, pompous boy," with this she chuckled, now sad and tearing at his heart-strings, "who has managed to capture my heart and leave it so suddenly." She silenced herself, and a new smile was born from the other's ashes.

This one spoke sadness, it spoke a new language of regret and pain. Yet now it held new acceptance. It held a true emotion that the man could not quite put a word to, and he assumed it to ultimately be love. This smile held love and caring, something so extremely opposite of this entity and quite nearly gave the man a terrible headache.

How could one human hold so many emotions? So he asked.

"I told you before," She responded, "I am not human."

"So what do you call yourself?" The man asked, leaning in to catch every glimpse of a feeling in her golden flecked eyes.

"A witch." And she smiled once more, that old beautiful one he nearly missed in the time it was replaced with anguish and heartbreak. "A witch without her warlock."

"We shall leave it at that then?"

"Yes," she said, a smile in her tone and a grin in her eyes, "we shall leave it at that."

She left him the next morning, not a single warning, and the man never once saw her again in his continuing aimless story.

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C.C., the cart man, and everything else (c) Sunrise/CLAMP/Everyone else.


End file.
